UNCHASTITY 211 



Filthy Dreamers.— This perversion of a natural 

 instinct, and those sndden lapses from virtue which 

 startle a small portion of the community, and afford 

 a filthy kind of pleasure to the other part, are but the 

 outgrowths of mental unchastity. ' ' Filthy dreamers, ' ' 

 before they are aware, become filthy in action. The 

 thoughts mold the brain, as certainly as the brain molds 

 the thoughts. Rapidly down the current of sensual- 

 ity is swept the individual who yields his imagination 

 to the contemplation of lascivious themes. Before he 

 knows his danger, he finds himself deep in the mire 

 of concupiscence. He may preserve a fair exterior; 

 but the deception cannot cleanse the slime from his 

 putrid soul. How many a church member carries un- 

 der a garb of piety a soul filled with abominations, no 

 human scrutiny can tell. How many pulpits are filled 

 by '^whited sepulchers," only the Judgment will dis- 

 close. 



Unchaste Conversation.— ''Out of the abundance 

 of the heart the mouth speaketh." ''Every idle word 

 that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof 

 in the day of Judgment." "By thy words thou shalt 

 be condemned." Matt. 12:34, 36, 37. In these three 

 brief sentences, Christ presents the whole moral aspect 

 of the subject of this paragraph. To any one who 

 will ponder well His weighty words, no further remark 

 is necessary. Let filthy talkers but consider for a mo- 

 ment what a multitude of "idle," unclean words are 

 waiting for account in the final day ; and then let them 

 consider what a load of condemnation must roll upon 

 their guilty souls when strict justice is meted out to 

 every one before the bar of Omnipotence, and in the 

 face of all the world— of all the universe. 



The common habit among boys and young men o^ 



